Sunday, 22 December 2013

Characters in search of a Painter: meta-theatricality in the art of Robert McLeod

“ I hate symbolic art, for it makes a mechanical structure, an allegory, out of all representation, destroying its spontaneity, reducing the creative impulse to an empty and short-sighted effort; for the mere fact of giving an allegorical meaning to what is being represented indicates that the representation proper is held in low esteem, as having in itself no truth, whether real or imaginary ”.

I recently came across this statement by Italian dramatist Luigi Pirandello (1867- 1936). It immediately struck me as having some resonance in the work of New Zealand painter Robert McLeod.

Bowen Gallery Show (2004) and "Two High-rises - One Foreign" (2007)

In recent years, as McLeod’s paintings became increasingly figurative and representational, the theatrical nature of his work has become more overt. First appearing in 1999, Mutant Mickey has been joined by a cast of near-archetypal, disarmingly cartoony props and characters: briefcases, ties, glasses, socks, tartans, Tweety, Popeye, Dandini, The Small Man, The Judge, The Impostor, Graces, Working Girls, Caveman, Banshee, Superhero, The Communicator, Small-Man-in-Thick-Skin, Richter Robot, Blank Face, Paint Gloop Alien, The Immigrant, The Angels, Miley.

Like Pirandello in his controversial 1921 play “Six Characters in Search of an Author”, McLeod resists interpretive readings of his work, subverting the characters' stories to his own script, the greater narrative of Painting. His complex, layered compositions leave any search for meaning at a loose end, any narrative indeterminate. He uses meta-theatrical devices to break the conventional relationship to the audience. Out of the frame, off the wall, onto the floor: characters push and twerk against the picture plane, spill into the room and invade the viewers’ haptic space. Flaunting their pedigree in Automatic Surrealism, Cubism and Abstract Expressionism these tableaux tauntingly claim for Painting a territory traditionally occupied by Sculpture and Installation.

"Mixing Different Heavens" Tauranga Art Gallery, New Zealand, 2012

" Imposters, Aliens and Angels" Pataka Art Museum, New Zealand, 2013

" Imposters, Aliens and Angels" Pataka Art Museum, New Zealand, 2013

McLeod uses drawing as a way back into painting when he is feeling stuck. In his recent large drawings he has made a surprising and tantalizing move: In front of dynamically graphic, black-and-white drawings are hung some of his colourful puppet-like creations.

Studio December 2013

Studio December 2013

Composed of fabric, wire, paper and painted plywood elements, these hybrid, emergent creatures hang in a state of suspended animation, poised both in and out of the scene, waiting for The Painter to make his next life-giving move.

About Me

I work with drawing, painting, video and animation. I'm a lapsed architect so buildings and urban places fascinate me as much as their inhabitants. I aim to discover and draw out the poetics of my relationships to people and place.